Mia
My fingers slid against the rough strings of my violin. With closed eyes, my bow moved with careful precision and music emanated from my instrument. My body was in tune to it, but my thoughts and my heart kept going back to X and the latest letter I received so soon after sending my own.
Something felt different about this particular letter.
In our back and forth, there was always an eagerness that we each held to get to know one another.
But this time there was more than that. A longing.
A yearning. I felt it through the ink, so much that I had to pause reading and sit back, assess the letter again, and now…
I was pouring my feelings into the music.
As if that could clear my head from the confusion.
But was it confusion or clarity I was feeling?
Because my heart was tugging me towards that letter, pushing me towards what I knew I wanted.
The bow scraped against the violin, creating a screeching, halting sound that made me wince. With a sigh, I gently placed my instrument back in its case. It seemed that composing was going to have to wait for a bit.
Trudging through crumpled sheet music I’d carelessly tossed to the floor, I slid into my chair and picked up X’s letter once again, my eyes quickly scanning words though I had no need for it when I’d already had them memorized.
Maybe I was crazy for what I was about to do, for what I was thinking, but I didn’t care.
There alone in my little apartment, far away from my family, I felt the crushing weight of loneliness.
It gripped me, almost suffocating in its embrace.
There were so many people around me. Living, breathing, walking, but still somehow I felt so alone.
After weeks of getting to know X, that loneliness had started to feel less and less, but these letters? They weren’t enough.
I wanted more.
I wanted to see the smile behind the words on the page. The serious brow I imagined on the person as he penned this letter to me, a complete stranger on the other side of a door.
So I picked up my pen… and I began to write.
X,
I want to meet. In person. Can we? Name a time and a place.
With love,
M.
I kept it short and quick, eager for his response.
I didn’t want to think that I was making some sort of penpal faux pas, but even if I was, I didn’t care.
I wasn’t imagining the care he took with his words.
If he didn’t like me, at least a little, he would have stopped responding long ago.
At this point, I didn’t care that I hadn’t seen him in person.
I didn’t know what he looked like, but that was fine. I knew him down to his core.
And I liked him.
I could only imagine what my ma and aunties would think if they knew what I was doing. They’d berate me, surely, but I could also hear the never-ending inquiries that never failed every time I went home to visit.
“Why haven’t you found yourself a husband?”
“When will you get married?”
“You need a husband so that you don’t get lonely…”
That word again.
It made my chest pinch.
I led a fulfilling life, with a career in composing music that I was incredibly proud of. But I did miss something I had only ever longed for through music.
And it was time I crawled out of the shell I’d built for myself and found it.
Sucking in a deep breath, I stormed over to my front door, careful to place the letter where I always did just before I slipped back inside.
This time, I refused to fall asleep when he arrived to take it. This time, I would force myself to wait…
I wasn’t sure if I’d open the door, if I wanted to take the choice away from him to be seen or not. It would feel like a violation to do that, but I wanted to be there when he picked up the note.
And then, he could tell me if he wanted to meet. To maybe… see where this could go? Explore ourselves beyond the written word… I just wanted to see if we were compatible in person the way we were on page.
So I sat, fiddling with my fingers, and I waited for night to fall. For the lights in the hallway to go on. For the shadows to finally appear…
My breath caught at the sight of them pausing just beneath my doorway.
Everything inside me warmed at the sight, and I found myself smiling even as nerves made my palms clammy and my heart beat all too fast in my chest.
Slowly, I pushed myself to a stand, almost expecting those shadows to disappear.
There was the tell-tale scrape against my door, the rustle of paper…
My hand closed around the door knob without even knowing what I was doing. My breath was caught in my throat, but I couldn’t seem to stop myself. I wasn’t going to open it, at least not all the way. Just a fraction. Just a little bit so I could speak, so he could hear.
I wasn’t sure where the bravery came from, but it came as I turned the knob and started to push it open…
A palm shoved it back with a countered, gentle firmness.
I gasped as the door refused to budge open wider. There was only a crack. A tiny crack.
My throat tightened.
That was all I needed…
“Um… Hi…”
Not smooth at all.
My face heated at that pathetic introduction.
“X?”
The palm held firm against the door, but I heard rustling on the other end.
“I’m sorry I opened the door,” I whispered, feeling like it was necessary to explain myself.
“I know that’s not been part of our dynamic but…
” I let the word trail off, waiting to see if he’d say something, anything.
When he didn’t, I pushed on, determined to get something–anything–out of him.
“I’ve enjoyed writing back and forth with you,” I confessed.
“You’re the first real friend I’ve had in a long time… ”
There was another long pause, and still he said nothing.
Panic started to seep in.
Maybe I had this all wrong. Maybe this was a mistake, one I couldn’t go back from now that I’d committed it… Would he forgive me?
I started to pull the door closed.
“Sorry, I’ll leave you alone–”
But then…
“Wait.”
His voice stopped me from putting that barrier between us.
And his voice… It was…
It was everything.
Whispered as it was, I could make out the deep, grave tones. There was a rasp to it, a slight growl. It felt more beast than man and sent shivers down my spine, like I was prey and he was predator.
“I have enjoyed writing to you as well,” he whispered.
I could just make out the workings of an accent, though I couldn’t quite place from where.
Would it be rude to ask where he was from?
I hated getting the question myself, when nosey assholes with no self awareness tried to figure out what part of Asia I came from.
“What are you?” seemed more derogatory than not, half the time, and the idiots that asked didn’t even know where China was on a map, anyway.
But I was curious. He almost sounded Latino, but I couldn’t be sure.
My heart fluttered at his words, though. At the confirmation I didn’t know I needed.
We seemed to bask in that fact for a long time, until I realized we couldn’t stay like this all night.
“I want to meet,” I told him. “Not now… maybe not tomorrow. But I want to meet. In person. And you don’t have to answer right now. Think about it and let me know.”
There was a brief pause.
“Yesss…” The word sounded like a hiss.
I smiled, pressing my forehead against the door. “My name is Mia, by the way.” My hand tightened on the knob. “Mia Song.”
I didn’t think he would reply, so I started to pull the door closed, but his grip tightened a final time right before he said. “And I am Xavir.”
Sha-veer.
I rolled the pronunciation in my head and smiled before he finally, gently, closed the door between us.